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B 


ROBERT  ERNEST  COWAN 


Sixth  American   Edition 


A  book  that  La  all  parts  of  the  wdrl 
become  his  brother's  helper  tbsa 


<\DAIR   WELCKEH 


The  following  criticism  and  comment  were  in  the  form  of  a  printed  page, 
pasted  into  copies  of  the  third  edition  of  this  book,  on  November  20, 1902,  and 
copies  were,  on  November  21st  and  thereafter,  mailed  to  different  countries: 

CRITICISM 

The  London  (England)  Daily  Chronicle,  November  4,  1902,  said:  "It  was 
the  discrepancy  between  price  and  apparent  valne  that  first  fixed  our  attention 
on  this  paper-covered  pamphlet  of  six  and  thirty  pages.  Then,  the  announce 
ment  on  the  cover  stirred  curiosity,  'A  book  that  in  all  parts  of  the  world  is 
giving  to  each  man  more  courage  to  become  his  brother's  helper  than  have  any 
or  all  books  of  the  past  time.'  Then  for  a  moment,  seeing  that  this  unique 
work  first  appeared  in  1885  and  is  now  in  its  third  edition,  we  are  ashamed  of 
ourselves.  Where  had  been  our  eyes  these  seventeen  years?  But  ten  minutes' 
reading  of  this  drama  in  four  acts  and  twenty-eight  pages  showed  us  that  we 
were  face  to  face  with  a  specimen  of  what  we  may  call  freak  literature. 
England  has  its  literary  freaks,  who  write  of  the  Lost  Ten  Tubes  and  the 
flatness  of  the  earth,  and  so  on;  but  in  this  department,  America  is  supreme. 
It  has  produced  Ignatius  Donnelly,  it  has  produced  the  Christian  Science 
Bible,  onejof  the  silliest  books  ever  written.  These,  however,  have  at  least  the 
excuse  of  a  definite  object.  We  cannot  tell  what  Mr.  Welcker  is  driving  at, 
for  when  his  blank  verse  scans  itsconveys  no  meaning,  and  when  it  doesn't  it 
is  excruciating.  *  *  He  ie  mercifully  conscious  of  other  people's  human 
limitations,  and  devotes  a  supplement  to  explaining  himself  to  the  '  British 
reviewers.'  But,  even  here,  there  is  no  '  glowing  light.'  You  will  understand 
this  if  you  will  kindly  read  the  following  passage  from  a  prefatory  note." — 

[The  critic  here  sets  out  the  first  seventeen  lines  of  the  Second  Prefatory 
Note  of  the  book,  and  then  continues.]  *  *  "  But  one  is  almost  inclined 
to  regret  the  freedom  of  the  press  and  long  for  some  matriculation  examina 
tion  which  should  exclude  from  literature  all  who  cannot  think,  consecutively 
for,  say — five  seconds.  The  examiners  would  certainly  plough  a  whole  batch 
of  freak  book-makers,  and  among  them  Mr.  Welcker." 

AN  ECHO  OF  THE  ABOVE. 

For  the  purpose  apparently  of  staying  it,  upon  a  foundation  of  sand  building 
np  before  it  a  small  mound  of  opinion  to  stop  the  incoming  tide  of  the  work's 
progress,  the  Chicago  Daily  News,  without — by  first  setting  forth  some  proof 
that  it  begins  to  comprehend  the  work — showing  its  right  to  form  a  conclu 
sion  in  regard  to  it,  yet  takes  occasion  to  indorse  the  London  Daily  Chronicle, 
in  the  conclusion  that  it  comes  to. 

connENT 

The  book,  indeed,  has  in  it  that  which  would  not  be  grasped  by  a  body  of 
wise  men  to  whom  the  Daily  Chronicle  would  almost  give  the  power  to  suppress. 
They,  like  the  London  Chronicle,  would  (if  it  would),  even  before  they  had 
come  to  find  out  the  work's  meaning,  be  ready  to  suppress  it.  For,  being 
selected  because  of  the  expert  knowledge  of  letters  possessed  by  them,  they 
would  have,  along  with  this  knowledge,  the  sort  of  wisdom  and  prudence,  and 
caution — lest  they  should  lose  something — to  which  a  work  of  this  character, 
because  of  the  fact  that  it  is  seen  to  be  different  from  their  own,  is  ever  an 
offense. 

The  immovable  power  and  strength,  which  British  reviewers,  without  being 
able  themselves  to  explain  why,  have  recognized,  to  be  in  the  work,  rests  not 
in  the  figures  or  letters,  among  which  writers  on  the  Chronicle  have  so 
diligently  sought,  but  the  might  of  it  is  spirit.  And  the  work  is  one  that  is  never 
to  be  suppressed.  For  in  it  is  something  that,  though  tribunals,  too,  were  estab 
lished  to  put  into  operation  despotism  in  connection  with  literature,  is 
stronger  than  imperial  conduct;  stronger  than  are  they, — and  it  is  the  end  of 
the  methods  by  which  countries  large  have  come,  at  times,  to  take  their  land, 
nd  their  right  to  self  rule,  away  from  peoples  little. 


A  REVIEW  AND  A  QUESTION. 

The  brave— (for  the  daring  alone  are  those  who  grow  into  comprehension  of 
things  eternal)— critic  selected  to  review  this  work  in  the  London  Magazine 
Anubis,  of  December,  1902,  in  the  course  of  the  review,  after  quoting  pas 
sages  in  it,  said:  "  Would  that  these  lines  might  be  blazoned  in  fire  on  every 
*w& 

[Not  only,  now,  is  the  handwriting  of  the  work  on  walls  throughout  the 
world  here,  bat  the  power  and  splendor  of  it,  which  no  man  has  been  or  can  be 
able  to  gainsay  or  overcome,  is,  with  an  intense  joy,  recognized  to  be  estab 
lished  by  those  who  dwell  upon  the  outer  edges  of  many  another.] 

The  reviewer  closes  the  review  with  these  words:  "  We  would  fain  ask  the 
author's  reason  for  placing  an  almost  prohibitive  price  on  it "  [the  work]  ? 

THE  ANSWER  TO  THE  QUERY. 

The  reviewer's  query  arose  from  the  fact  that  the  announcement  in  the  front 
of  the  book  criticised  is,  that  only  signed  copies  will  be  sold  by  the  author , 
•and  at  $10  per  copy;  but  that  typewritten  or  MS.  copies  may  be  made  by  any 
persons,  who  may  sell  them  for  what  they  will.  Now,  what  constitutes  the 
answer  to  thelquestion  of  the  reviewer  is  this:  There  may  be  many  who,  for  a 
price  that  would  not  seem  prohibitive— who  for  five  dollars,  perhaps,  or  even 
less— would  make  MS.  or  typewritten  copies.  Thus,  an  increasing  number  of 
people  will  have  an  opportunity  created  by  which  they  will  be  enabled  to 
make  a  living  until  a  better  opportunity  is  before  them.  Even  if,  upon  its 
face,  an  effort  to  bring  about  such  a  result  appears  to  be  illogical,  or  absurd, 
or  foolish,  still  if,  at  the  time  of  making  it,  it  does  not  appear  to  be  within 
our  power  to  make  any  of  another  kind,  to  obtain  for  "  houseless  heads  "  a 
shelter,  let  us  be  then  at  least  the  kind  of  fools  that  will  make  the  effort.  Vf& 
thereby  may  achieve  the  splendid  success  of  not  being  spoken  well  of  by  all 
men  for  having  made  it. 

I  saw  after  midnight — at  a  time  when  the  German  state  had  provided  for  its 
soldiers,  their  officers,  the  Emperor  and  his  household,  warm  clothes,  sufficient 
food,  and  a  roof,  while  the  snow  was  falling,  huddled  together  in  doorways, 
upon  the  highways  of  the  German  capital,  because  the  jails  were  already  filled — 
so  it  was  said — to  the  limit,  mothers  and  their  little  ones,  and  old  men,  whose 
"  houseless  heads,  whose  unfed  sides,  whose  looped  and  windowed  raggedness  ' ' 
were  not  for  them  a  defense  against  the  inclemency  of  the  season.  And  having 
noted  the  officers  and  soldiers,  and  Emperor  and  Emperor's  household,  who 
were  first  clothed  and  fed,  before  these  women  and  babes  and  old  men — having 
noted  these  soldiers  and  officers  and  Emperor  and  Emperor's  household,  for 
whom  the  German  state  provided,  seeing  that  the  state  did  not  also  provide 
for  these  less  strong  ones  also  labor  and  occupation,  by  means  of  which  to 
obtain  them — I  remembered  words  that  then  applied  to  this  German  state  and 
to  any  which  does  not,  with  exact  and  equal  justice  to  all  citizens  alike,  fur 
nish  opportunity  to  obtain,  by  their  hands,  so  much  as  to  these  others  had 
already  been  given— clothing  sufficient  for  warmth,  nourishment  sufficient  for 
health,  and  a  roof:  Inasmuch  as  you  did  it  NOT  to  one  of  the  least  of  these 
you  did  it  NOT  to  me. 

At  some  future  date  the  author  of  this  work  may — if  the  German  govern 
ment  shall,  in  the  meantime,  first  have  seen  to  it  that  by  day  or  night  no  one 
will  any  more  have  to  walk  the  streets  of  its  capital  lacking  clothes,  or  bread, 
or  roof —come  again  to  visit  that  city. 

ADAIB  WELCKER. 


A  Dream  of  Realms  Beyond  Us 


ADAIR    WELCKER 

831  Pine  Street,  San  Francisco,  Gal. 

SIXTH  SEPARATE  AMERICAN  EDITION 

Matter  not  in  previous  editions  is  contained  in  this.     In  a  later  edition  there 

may  be  an   undertaking;   made  to   make   clear  some  of  the 

meanings  of  acts  of  Nature  not  herein  set  forth. 


Copyright  1885  by  Adair  Welcker. 
Copyright  1900  by  Adair  Welcker. 


This  is  a  book,  the  earlier  issnes  of  which  have  been  placed  in  the  hands 
of  many  readers  in  Canada,  the  United  States,  Australia,  Asia,  Africa  and  Great 
Britain,  •where,  with  an  attraction  stronger  than  iron,  it  has  become  one  with 
what  is  in  the  depths  of  Earth's  profonndest  and  greatest,  differing  from 
other  books  in  this:  that  here  a  new  work  has  been  attempted;  that  of  setting 
forth  not  alone  things,  bnt  the  meaning  of  things;  that  of  giving,  not  direc 
tions  to  do  things,  but  the  reason  why  things  should  be  done,  or  be  not  done. 
For,  for  the  world  to  do  this,  will  be  for  it  to  step  out  of  the  age  in  which 
violence  has  held  sway,  into  another,  in  which  there  will  be  none,  in  anticipa 
tion  whereof  the  time  is  to  be  when  monuments  now  made  of  stone  or  metal 
for  war's  victories  are  to  be  erected  to  be,  and  to  be  gazed  upon  only  as  monu 
ments  to  indicate  a  people's  shame,  or  remorse. 

The  price  of  this  book  is  40  shillings,  or  $10,  if  bought  from  the  author; 
but  all  people  are  at  liberty  to  make  MS.  or  typewritten  copies  and  f-ell  them 
for  what  they  will.  Copies  sold  by  the  author  will  be  signed  by  him.  It  is, 
however,  his  desire  that  all  persons  who  would  be  in  any  difficulty  to  pay  to 
him  the  price  that  he  speaks  of  for  a  copy,  will,  instead,  employ  people  to 
make  for  them,  or  themselves  make  for  themselves,  typewritten  or  MS.  copies. 


SAN     FRANCISCO: 

CUBEBY   AND    COMPANY,   BOOK  AND  JOB    PBINTEKS,  No    587    MISSION  SlBKBT 

,4908       ;  ;«  ,', 


PREFATORY   NOTE: 

The  undertaking  in  this  work  has  been  to  follow  a 
method  which  has  not  before  been  followed;  to  take  a  step  which 
comes  after  those  which  in  religion  and  philosophy  have  already 
been  taken;  to  put  into  the  work  that  which  no  method  of  philos 
ophy  has  yet  had  in  it;  that  which  alone,  after  the  work  done  in 
the  past,  can,  with  it,  because  of  the  manner  in  which  it  will  create 
a  new  vision  within  earth,  cause  peace  upon  earth  to  come.  It 
has  been  intended  to  put  into  it  and,  through  it,  into  earth,  that 
act  of  the  endless-world  art  that  will  so  touch  the  souls  of  men 
that  into  them  will  be  caused  gradually  to  come,  from  this  time 
on,  perception  and  a  knowledge  of  the  meaning  and  purpose  of 
things.  For,  over  those  matters  out  of  which  do  not  come  to  the 
co  souls  of  men  a  spirit,  and  an  understanding  of  them,  men  must 

GT> 

»—  perforce  still  war;   but  out  of  understanding,  and  from  under- 
^  standing,  will  alone  come  that  which  will  turn  their  battleships 

o=  into  rust  and  their  armies  into  a  nightmare  no  longer  to  be 

pp 

Hi  dreamed  by  earth. 

^          Then,  in  place  of  these  childish  follies,  will  highest  manhood, 

o  in  the  form  of  conscience,  be  caused  to  come  down,  and  be,  and 

p-« 

dwell  upon  earth.  Then  there  will  not  be  done  by  armies  of  peo 
ple  that  thieve  and  partition,  or  be  done  to  women  and  babes  in 
camps  of  concentration,  work  for  which  a  Herod  of  old,  of  Judea, 
or  a  Jack  the  Eipper,  should  blush.  Then  will  there  be  done 
those  high  and  serious  things  that  will  be  worthy  of  men  grown 
up,  when,  through  the  discovery — which  sense  and  ability  will 
make  for  them— that  peace  is  best,  there  will  at  last  come  and  be 
between  and  among  men  goodwill. 


29901," 


SECOND  PREFATORY  NOTE: 

This  work— a  dream  and  more  than  a  dream— dealing 
with  matters  upon  which  the  minds  of  men  throughout  the  world 
are,  at  the  present  time,  profoundly  fixed,  is  here  presented  to  the 
reader  in  an  incomplete  form.  At  some  future  date,  should  the 
governors  and  rulers  of  institutions  of  learning  who  have,  in  all 
lands,  been  made  trustees  by  their  people,  and  given  large  endow 
ments  for  their  institutions,  with  the  belief  that,  with  them,  they 
could  be  aided  to  be  watchmen,  upon  their  behalf,  in  her  night 
time  of  art — thought,  by  such  methods,  to  be  by  them,  furnished 
with  all  manner  of  means  to  keep  an  outlook  for  the  emergence 
into  the  world,  not  only  of  art,  but  of  each  letter  of  the  law  which 
will  otherwise  be  found,  and  found  there  only,  where  things 
change  not — in  its  unseen  place — see  here,  in  behalf  of  the  people 
who  have  intrusted  them  to  be  for  them  their  watchmen,  signs  of 
something  that  might  be  added  to  what  is  here,  which  would  be 
of  the  law  a  part,  and  of  art  that  part  that  is  art  transcendent, 
then  will  that  which  is  not  now  here  be  added. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  they  shall  not  so  see,  they  will  have  had 
an  opportunity  to  do— for  those  for  whom  they  hold  a  trust  than 
which  none  higher  is  ever  placed  in  the  hands  of  men — that 
which,  in  connection  with  it,  they  shall  have  deemed  to  have  been 
their  duty  for  those  who  have  trusted  them,  both  as  their  agents 
and  regents. 

Let  it  not  be  supposed  however,  that  there  could  be  here 
expressed  towards  any  a  thought  or  word  of  coercion;  for  into  the 
last  and  highest  region  of  art,  which  is  the  place  where  all  action 
is  in  perfect  freedom,  coercion  and  oppression  cannot  come :  in  that 
kingdom  of  art  not  an  act,  and  not  even  an  imperialistic  or 
despotic  thought  can  be:  for  with  its  kingdom  they  have  no 
proportion,  and  into  it  cannot  enter. 


A  DREAM  OF  REALMS  BEYOND  US, 


BY  ADAIR  WELCKEB. 

ACT  I. 

Scene. — A  level  space  in  the  evening  clouds  of  heaven,  above  the 
Golden  Gate,  surrounded  by,  and  having  above  them — mass 
back  of  mass — the  purple  and  gold  clouds  of  heaven;  and 
within  them,  on  the  cloud-plain,  and  composed  of  their  sub 
stances,  tents.  A  throne,  wrought  of  the  hues  of  the  rainbow, 
upon  which  rests  a  spirit  named  ELMO.  Below,  the  uplifted 
heads  of  the  Gate  that  opens  upon  the  ocean  Pacific. 

ETHERIA — Beloved  commanding  spirit,  I  have  obeyed, 
In  all  respects,  your  dear  commands. 
Seizing  my  silvery  staff,  and  placing  therein 
Sweet  thoughts  to  be  attracted  westward 
Around  the  world,  back  to  those  other  thoughts 
Held  by  you  here,  I  sped  upon  my  mission. 

ELIDAH — While  that  abomination  we  have  seen 
On  Earth,  that's  desolation,  also  have  we  viewed 
Fire  once  more  brought;  the  star  once  more  ablaze; 
Forth  from  the  act  that,  through  the  ages  ages 
Each  man,  when  he  will  know  the  doctrine,  may  do; 
By  which  each  man,  who  loves,  more  than  the  ropes 
Of  wealth,  or  goods,  or  place,  or  men's  esteem, 
Wisdom  and  understanding  and  more  life, 
May  break  those  bonds  that  hold  him  to  the  rock 
Till  he  be  son  of  man.     So,  now  come  we  here 
To  note  what,  by  the  law,  must  follow  after. 


8 

ETHEEIA — The  day  I  left  behind:  outran  the  sun; 
Entered  the  towering  palace  of  the  dark 
That,  through  all  time,  stands  opposite  the  sun. 
I  then  swept  through  its  curious  moonlit  halls, 
And  there  I  met  these  hideous  impish  sprites 
That  dwell  within  the  pointed  tower  of  night 
That  circles  earth  as  shadow  of  the  sun. 
I  found  them  mingling  ever,  elements— 
Making  compounds  to  thwart  the  course  of  nature. 
From  them  I  learned  but  little  of  these  beings 
That  dwell  in  contact  with  the  earth  below  us. 
But  when  I  overtook  the  blue  of  morning, 
Found  I  some  beings  from  a  distant  sphere, 
Larger  than  mountains,  resting  in  their  ships 
That  ride  the  seas  of  space.     They  told  me  that  men 
Did  seem  to  have  a  vague  intelligence. 
Yet,  knowing  not  that  low  intelligence 
And  strife  must  co-exist;  that  vision  vast 
Moves  only  out  from  rest;  make  they  their  choice: 
So,  through  the  centuries  long,  dwell  they  in  doubt; 
And,  through  the  centuries  long,  swells  up  their  outcry- 
Up,  through  the  dark  their  violence  does  make — 
For  light;  whose  narrow  outlet  can  be  but  through  peace. 
But,  as  the  blue  of  dawn  changed  to  that  hue 
In  which  the  later  day  does  dress  herself, 
The  prospect  blurred;  the  pressure  changed;  until 
These  beings  could  no  longer  stop  near  earth; 
Therefore,  unmoored  their  ships;  and  on  an  ohm 
Were  swept  through  space,  back  to  their  home  again. 

ELMO — Learned  you  no  more? 

ETHEBIA — I  noted  this:  men  did  not 


See  that  themselves  are  makers  of  themselves; 
Makers  of  flowers  and  fruits,  of  dearths  and  famines; 
And  that  the  years  in  which  would  famines  come 
Were  in  themselves  inscribed,  and  years  of  plenty. 
That  when  they  grasping  grew  and  sought  without, 
Where  is  the  place  of  sand,  flow  and  effects, 
Prosperity,  came  after  dearth  of  growths; 
But  honest  deeds  of  nations  would  make  birds 
Carol  and  their  earth  blossom.     That  they  knew  not 
They  should  be  glad  for  hardships  placed  upon  them, 
And  know  them  wealth  for  their  soul's  treasure-house — 
Seeing,  who  has  the  heaviest  put  upon  him 
Is  one,  for  strength  selected,  to  make  richest 
If  that  same   strength  can  hold   him,  when  wronged, 

silent. 
ELIDAH — Lowest  in  all  those  things  that  mankind 

most  prize; 

Himself,  with  goodwill  taking  all  that  comes, 
Not  murmuring;  himself  acknowledging — 
(The  cause  being  that  whereof  he  will  not  speak)— 
One  who  has  failed;  one  low,  one  with  the  lowest: 
By  such  life,  from  the  sea  forth,  if  they  take  it, 
May  men  learn  through  what  brine-salt  bitter  thing, 
The  belly  given,  the  soul  may  loosed  be. 
Higher  than  institutions,  beyond  schools, 
Must  men  go  would  they  learn  more  than  their  most. 
Ceasing  to  hope  for  gain,  to  store  up  stores, 
Out  of  the  depths,  out  of  misfortune's  well, 
Must  know  that  wisdom  comes :  with  manhood  high, 
With  grit,  receive  misfortunes,  in  all  forms, 
As  those  sole  lessons  that  can  teach  the  soul. 


10 

Shaped  in  no  other  form  can  wisdom  reach  it — 
Only  in  that  pass  the  soul's  gate,  the  heart. 
For  life  in  essence,  fortune  is  no  food;  and  wealth 
For  the  soul's  frame  supplies  thus  much,  not  more; 
Stagnation  time  between  each  act,  each  labor. 

AIDAEL — Bear  they  the  drawing  of  the  Southern  Cross  ? 
Note  they  influences  of  the  Pleiades? 
Sees  each  his  likeness,  blow  by  blow,  from  star  dust, 
Through  all  his  days,  from  model  changeless,  wrought  out, 
That,  time  beneath  it,  still  stands,  with  us,  deathless? 
Knowing  what  poets  have  been  moved  to  write 
Must,  in  a  measured  time,  appear  in  heaven : 
Have  they  interpreters,  when  stars  out  write  it, 
Beyond  their  sunset — sapients  who  may  read 
What  these  star  pathways  show,  and  shown,  leave  trace- 
less? 
Have  they  yet  learned  to  speak  out  that  star  language, 

which 

Spoken  to  stars  dark,  each  one  after  another 
Succeeding,  touched,  becomes  a  glowing  light, 
A  beacon  burning  out  upon  the  night? 
Know  they  the  way 
Men  may  awaken  stars  that  are  asleep? 

ETHEON — With  zephyr  thoughts,  but  granite  preju 
dices, 

Through  strife  they're  still  kept  blind  to  other  worlds; 
Through  greed  from  knowing  that  they  are  themselves. 
Their  eyes  are  flesh,  and  through  that  flesh  they  look, 
Yet  know  they  not  themselves  that  have  looked  through  it. 
Men  seem  as  fishes  dwelling  in  the  ocean, 
Oblivious  of  all  beings  up  above  them. 

BLANTHA— This  day  I  seized  upon  th'returning  ray 


11 

Of  the  revolving  light  from  sun  to  earth. 

I  passed  the  point  those  rays  opposed  do  cross : 

And  sitting  alone  upon 

The  foremost  promontory  of  the  sun 

Watched  I  the  silver  earth  as  it  revolved, 

Yet  learned  but  little.     But  I  learned  thus  much: 

That  earth,  whereon  they  dwell,  by  their  own  acts 

Is  built, 

Eight  faith  being  of  intelligence  the  highest; 

This  builds  the  frame :  things  come  according  to  it. 

And  only  faith  in  all  brave  ones  gone  from  them. 

As  never  dead,  will  turn  to  naught  the  mist, 

And  have  it  gone,  that's  been  the  wall  between  us. 

That  world,  below,  is  built  as  is  right  faith,  and  grows 

According  to  that  faith.     Men's  disbelief 

In  us,  it  is,  that  still  builds  up  the  wall 

That  hides  us  from  them. 

Then  (as  a  heart  is  curved)  their  acts  from  it 

Are  prompted:     That  their  thoughts  descend  from  them 

Into  their  earth,  to  from  it  crying  come — 

Therefrom,  new  living.     The  form  of  it  proclaimed — 

Spoken  by  dazzling  voices;  glittered;  outspoken, 

Down  from  high  heaven  and  up.     And  this  saw  I : 

The  motive  power  that  moves  the  leaves  apart, 

From  bud  of  rose  to  bloom — 

The  meditation  in  a  woman's  heart. 

And  looking  to  see  their  cause,  within  the  forests 

The  lotus  flowers  that  bloom,  that,  unseen,  fade, 

Saw  I  moved  from  the  meditations  prime 

Of  those  saint's  hearts  whereof  the  world  knows  not; 

The  cobra's  life  move  from  a  man's  heart,  long 

On  murder  bent;  the  shy  lock  nature  feeding 


12 

Into  the  boa-constrictor's  form  its  force 
That  gives  it  life  to  crush.    The  skylark's  song 
Is  rapture;  borne  from  a  new  thought,  caught 
To  period  put  to  search  that  did  seem  endless. 

ELMO — Since  this  is,  then,  a  real  race  indeed, 
And  not — what  once  we  thought — but  plants  that  move, 
'Twere  well  for  us  to  better  their  condition. 
Has  any  other  of  this  company 
Brought  knowledge  of  this  odd,  discovered  race? 

ABNO — I  have,  for  fifteen  circlings  of  the  sun, 
Dwelt  opposite  to  him  in  midnight  darkness; 
And  not  being  able  to  go  close  to  earth, 
Have  caused  life-informed  force  to  obey  my  orders 
And  fetch  me  information  of  these  creatures. 
It  told  me  that  these  beings,  through  the  night, 
Seem  in  a  state  of  death;  but  come  to  light 
Out-wakened  by  the  wave  of  harmony 
The  sun  plays  on  his  rolling  lyre  of  earth. 
I  then  learned  that  they're  often  much  tormented 
By  growths  of  contest,  whose  poor  lives  are  measured, 
And  other  devilish  sprites 
That,  like  the  skates  and  mudfish  of  the  ocean, 
Dwell  at  the  bottom  of  the  seas  of  air. 
Although  'twas  hard  to  learn,  have  I  discovered — 
Through  pictures  shown  to  me  of  these  same  mortals — 
In  every  one  is  there  the  central  good; 
Which  good  will,  as  a  rose,  burst  into  bloom 
Beneath  the  glowing  light  that  looks  to  find  it. 
I  saw,  with  all,  that  love  outlasted  death; 
The  strength  of  mother's  love,  that's  not  of  earth. 
This  many  knew  not:     That  when,  from  their  bodies 
Themselves  would  be  withdrawn,  in  death  or  sleep, 


13 

Their  thoughts  will  (in  those  states)  for  them  become 

(To  all  whose  lives  those  same  thoughts  form) 

One  visible  and  solid  habitation;  one,  though,  unseen. 

Invisible  to  others  having  thoughts 

Less  rare  than  are  their  own.     Those  having  thoughts 

unlike : 

The  kind  the  brutal  see;  but  they,  to  them,  live  blind. 
Methinks  twould  be  a  pleasant  thing  indeed, 
To  help  them  lift  such  clouds  as  hide  their  light 
And  hold  them  blind  and  dead. 

ELMO — It  shall  be  done.     Now,  for  the  present  time, 
We'll  have  our  workmen,  in  their  shops  of  air, 
So  to  combine  and  forge  the  elements 
That  the  bright  song  of  twilight  shall  be  formed 
Ere  sinks  the  sun  to  his  cloud-curtained  bed. 
And,  to  that  end, 

Let  them  combine  the  light  that's  shot  from  Venus; 
The  color  of  the  ocean's  wave  by  moonlight, 
Above  the  violet  and  below  the  red; 
The  light  reflected  from  the  ocean's  teeth 
When  angrily  she  gnaws  the  edge  of  earth; 
The  dancing  atmosphere  of  summer  evenings; 
The  dizzy-moving  borealis  light; 
Weird  shadows  of  the  ancient  gloomy  forests; 
The  lulling  sound  of  dripping  unseen  waters — 
Above  their  treble  or  below  their  bass; 
Then  touch  all  with  the  breath  of  summer  air- 
More  delicate  than  the  sense  of  man  can  reach — 
When  every  flower  is  decked  in  glittering  dew — 
Its  gaudy  dress  worn  on  that  grand  occasion 
When's  heard  the  bow  of  promise,  the  storm  being  o'er. 
These  sights  and  sounds  our  spread,  our  feast  this  night. 


ACT  n. 

Scene. — A  California  forest  high  up  in  the  mountains.    A  small 
stream  comes  winding  through  the  woods. 

DE  PETZY  and  BLAUVELT  enter. 

BLAUVELT — Here  let  us  rest  and  make  tonight  our 

camp. 

And  let  our  tired  limbs  and  aching  bones 
Be  patients,  for  a  time,  to  such  attendants 
As  nature  sends  in  shape  of  cooling  winds 
Which,  to  the  patients  placed  beneath  their  care, 
Bring  balmy  odors  from  the  ferns  and  mosses 
And  many  an  herb,  till  we  are  healed  again. 

DE  PETZY — I  think  we  could  not  better  our  condition 
By  going  further  on.     Besides,  the  night — 

BLAUYELT — Drop  then  your  gun  and  rest  upon  this 

bank. 

How  sweet  the  air,  the  gurgling  of  this  stream ! 
There's  something  soothing  and  refreshing  to  me 
To  find  myself  afar  from  human  cares; 
Far  off,  beyond  the  sounding  of  an  echo 
Of  giant  mills  and  cities  soot-begrimmed: 
Our  sole  companions  these  dumb  trees  that  stand 
Holding  behind  their  grim  and  solemn  aspects 
The  secrets  of  a  thousand  passing  years 
Known  to  themselves  alone;  the  antlered  deer; 
Owls  whose  wise  looks  tell  of  their  secret  knowledge; 
And  other  beasts,  spellbound— made  dumb  by  nature 
To  hold  the  wondrous  things  that  they  have  seen. 

DE  PETZY — Ofttimes  my  mind  being  in  a  curious  mood. 


15 

When,  knowing  I've  been  never  out  of  it, 
But  all  I've  seen  and  read  within  myself, 
Earth  seemed  more  like  a  dream  than  any — a  fancy, 
That  strides  the  stage  of  sleep.     Is  it  not  odd 
That  we  are  held  here  on  this  piece  of  earth 
That  floats  a  bubble  on  the  seas  of  space? 
Such  being  our  lot  seems  a  disordered  dream — 
A  s'tate  of  odd  enchantment,  that  of  earth, 
While  real  things  are  unknown  all  to  us. 
BLAUVELT — I've  often  thought  something  more  worthy 
men 

Must  back  this  race  for  wealth.     That  gives  not  life. 

Thinking  beyond  accepted  thought  makes  that. 

For  thought  gets  life :  a  launching  out  by  faith — 

(Dead  to  all  earthly  haps) — alone  draws  that. 

In  all,  life  got,  takes  forms.     And,  thus,  comes  thought, 

Which,  new,  the  old  drives  out,  bearing  its  forms; 

Its  used;  its  dead — that  have  been.    And,  thus,  thought — 

(New  in,  old  out) — the  heart  moves:  bridge  from  life  to 

death. 

High  souls,  not  born,  wait  till  thought,  on  earth  gathered, 
Attracting,  draws  them  here  to  take  on  form — 
Thus  nature,  breathing,  gives  to  us  new  knowledge, 
Wonders  astonishing  and  unimaginable 
Being  yet  not  known. 

DE  PETZY — There's  surely  pleasant  contrast  in  these 

woods, 

For,  being  alone,  we  have  no  enemies; 
Being  far  away — off  from  the  race  of  men — 
But  having  none  to  hate  us,  we  have  not 
A  place  for  gentle  thoughts  to  reach  their  mark. 
Therefore,  a  life  apart  from  all  mankind 


16 

Is  one  not  natural,  one  with  parts  left  out. 

BLAUVELT — List  to  the  cooing  of  the  unseen  dove ! 
I  wonder  if  they,  too,  have  woes  of  love— 
Heave  mighty  sighs;  then  with  disturbed  visage, 
And  eyes  grown  mournfully  large,  gaze  they  upon 
Those  whom  they  love,  with  passionate,  pleading  looks? 
And  are  they  jealous,  like  men? 
And  have  they  friends,  or  foes,  or  foolish  customs 
To  break  sweet  nature's  course,  and  leave  love  hopeless  ? 

DE  PETZY — Why,  sure  it  is,  they  have  their  share  of 

woes, 

Wrought  chiefly  by  fear; 
Living  a  life  of  false  alarms  wrought  out; 
Mourn  for  their  friends,  and  in  their  sweetest  songs 
Cast  out  their  griefs  into  the  wide  world's  ear. 
But  now  I'll  leave  you  to  more  lonely  musings 
And  wander  off  t'explore  the  woods  around  us. 

[Exit  DE  PETZY.  BLAUVELT  lies  down  and  goes  to 
sleep.  Then  enter  ELIDAH,  AIDAEL,  and  also  WAVEA 
and  ELLOCK,  two  spirits  of  the  woods.] 

WAVBA — He  lies  asleep.    Upon  his  face  I'll  breathe, 
And,  through  my  breath,  infuse  my  nature  in  him, 
Creating  such  fancies  and  such  odd  conclusions — 
Harmless,  as  in  him  is  there  naught  of  hate — 
As  never  yet  were  lodged  in  mortal  mind. 
Then  shall  he  sweep  the  universe  with  thought 
And  stand  amazed  indeed  to  see  the  things 
Caught  in  his  net  of  reason. 

AIDAEL — But,  is  not  this  one  of  earth's  bards,  earth's 

prophets  ? 

One  of  those  rare  ones,  by  us  best  beloved, 
Who  may  not  lie  to  hold  place  or  position, 


17 

But,  doing  those  things  that  place  earth  beneath  them, 
Upon  the  rungs  of  such  a  ladder  made, 
Can,  to  us,  mount  in  vision? 

ELIDAH — One  of  the  ones  who  speak  in  metaphors, 
Which,  of  men's  thought,  being  nearest  to  the  language 
Wrought  by  our  state,  enables  us  to  give  back 
To  them  their  wisdom — 

With  courage  that  is  not  the  drum'd-drugged  sort, 
These  speak  the  truth,  when  that,  if  that  they  tell, 
Means  loss  of  place,  of  bread,  of  benefice. 
Soldiers  may  take  a  chance  to  die,  and  fear  not, 
If  clacquers  clack,  or  drums  go  loud  enough, 
What  is  called  death.     Here's  of  another  class; 
He's  of  a  band — of  those  strange  sturdy  ones 
That  fear  not 

The  poverty  before  which  governors  quake; 
At    which    (while    they    blanch    and    their    stomachs 

weaken) — 

Orders  obeying  rather  than  the  truth — 
Generals  and  admirals,  then  denying  it, 
Or,  in  place  of  it,  stating  what  is  not, 
Have  hidden  over  and  concealed  their  guilt. 
While  toward  such  men  bend  we  men's  high  plaudits, 
Their  wealth  and  honors, 

Against  our  dear  ones  have  we  turned  men's  jeers, 
And  had  them  buffet  them  and  hand  them  wounds. 
Yet,  while  at  their  amazement  we  have  laughed— 
Seeing  what  rotten  fruit  the  others  got, 
While  these  had  life— our  laughter  was  for  love's  sake. 
And  soldiers,  also,  who  were  more  than  such, 
And  admirals  have  been,  and  such  again  will  be, 
Who  will  obey  the  truth  and  bear  what  comes 


18 

When  they  those  disobey  by  whom  they're  ordered 
To  do  against  it,  and  serve  'gainst  the  right. 

WAVRA — Shall  we  then  plague  him? 

ELLOCK — Is't  not  against  ETHEEIA'S  commands, 
Who,  for  the  part  she  takes  in  that  great  work 
That  is  now  brewing  in  the  higher  heavens 
To  help  the  world — would  bring  these  two  together  ? 

WAVRA — Not  if  such  thoughts  are  placed  within  his 

brain 

T'attract  him  out  of  earth. 
I'll  let  him,  in  his  dreams,  tread  upward, 
And,  being  the  hero  of  his  deeds  of  sleep, 
Go  onward;  upward  through  those  many  realms — 
That  have  high  words  of  which  they  are  upbuilt, 
To  make  them  to  the  low  invisible — 
Where  waking  mortals  could  not  be  and  live. 
I'll  show  a  thousand  varied  scenes  in  hell 
Where,  there,  the  laughter  of  a  woman's  eyes 
Would  end  his  peace  forever; 
I'll  show  the  green  and  monstrous  angular  sprites 
That,  in  the  chilly  southern  seas  of  ice 
Where  shines  the  southern  cross,  control  the  waters 
And  make  the  choppy  seas  dash  icy  waves 
Against  the  mighty  domes  and  towers  of  ice 
Full  many  feet  in  air; 

That  drag  the  howling  winds  from  point  to  point, 
Shrieking  as  if  in  pain; 

That  lead  the  deadly  winds  against  the  ships, 
Icing  the  rigging,  freezing  the  sailors'  thumbs, 
And  then — white  fogs  unfold  upon  the  waters. 
And  all  the  while,  so  various  are  the  sounds— 
The  loud  reports,  the  rattling  of  floating  ice— 


19 

That  hell  itself  seems  there  to  have  an  echo. 
I'll  show  those  fourteen  stars  west  of  the  cross, 
Where  dwell  the  dreaded  mutineers  from  Venus. 
"We'll  show  where  was  the  pyramid  first  made. 
We'll  show  the  cloud-bound  caves  of  distant  realms 
Where  roam  forever  spirits  of  wild  beasts. 
And  then  we'll  show  the  wild  north-central  heaven 
Where  come  the  poisonous  winds  from  every  point 
Named    on    the  compass ;    mingling   their    poisonous 
breaths 


[Here  is  left  out  a  portion  of  the  matter  referred  to  in  the 
Prefatory  Nole,  in  order  that  the  institutions  of  learning  of  the 
world  may  determine  the  question  as  to  whether  or  not  it  is  prob 
able,  from  so  much  of  the  work  as  has  been  placed  before  them 
that  the  portion  not  placed  before  them  is  of  such  a  character 
that  it  should  be  permitted—  at  the  same  time  that  they  erect  and 
idolize  and  endow  buildings  of  stone  and  wood — as  they  stand  and 
look  on,  to  perish;  not  needed  to  be  put  into  expression;  not 
needed  to  be  taught  in  their  colleges  and  schools. 

As  it  Is  into  their  hands  that  the  people  have  placed  on  trust 
large  endowments  to  be  used  for  the  encouragement  of,  and  as  a 
means  of  giving  recognition  to,  the  work  of  those  who  give  their 
own,  in  order  that  they  may  work  in  the  art  kingdom;  and  as 
teachers  and  rulers  over  the  schools  have,  many  of  them,  given  to 
one  another  the  title  of  Master  in  these  matters  that  belong  to  the 
kingdom  of  art,  it  will  be  for  them,  sitting  in  the  character  of 
Masters  in  the  art  kingdom,  to  determine  whether  or  not  it  is  for 
them  to  pass  upon  the  question  here  presented — which  is  of  it. 

Much  better  would  it  be  if  these  charity  funds,  now  used  to 
aid  youth,  are  not  well  used,  that  they  should  be  used  to  improve 
and  add  to  the  comforts  of  those  noble,  charitable  homes,  alms- 
houses,  that,  because  the  heart  is  ever  wiser  than  doctrines  taught 
by  what  may  be  called  the  phariseeism  of  science,  have  been 
established  for  those  less  able  to  help  and  care  for  themselves  than 
the  young,  those  who  have  expended  more  of  their  energies  in  the 
work  of  the  world  than  the  young — the  old.] 


ACT  HI. 

Scene. — Same  as  Scene  1,  Act  I. 

ELMO — Since  it  has  been  resolved  by  us  to  each 
Help  on  some  other  being  of  this  race, 
Let  such  as  have  observed  them  give  the  news. 
What  has  been  seen? 

ELIDAH — Saw  I  an  island  in  the  ocean's  water, 
Where  sits  one  crying:     "Peace  on  earth;  goodwill!" 
Whose  garment's  fringe  is  soldiers,  scarlet  clad. 
Their  State  keeps  her.     She  feeds  from  those  they've 
slain. 

ETHEON — Beloved  spirit,  it  being  against  our  natures 
To  come  in  closer  contact  with  the  earth, 
Therefore,  I've  sought  out  beings  that  have  power 
To  walk  upon  the  surface  of  that  earth. 
Out  of  their  multitudes,  with  various  natures, 
Chose  I  the  laughing  sprites  called  from  the  woods 
To  serve  my  ends. 

ELMO — How  learned  y;>u  from  them? 

ETHKON — These  things  saw  I  through  them : 
That  kind  thoughts,  thoughts  of  others,  shall  expand  them, 
Giving  new  strength  and  power  of  life  to  both. 
Ill  thoughts  take  with  them  from  the  soul  that  throws 

them — 

Or,  peoples  thinking  less  of  other  peoples, 
By  that  made  measure — 
Part  of  its  store  of  strength: 
That  he,  as  well,  who  sees  another  suffer, 
Having  stored  up  what  could  be  his  relief, 


21 

And  does  not  use  it,  thus  deprives  himself 
In  exact  measure  by  those  his  possessions 
That  he  used  not. 

ELMO — Looking  on  such,  we  see — 
If  they  change  not,  how  blind,  how  wretched  they ! 
How  poor  these  are;  how  naked — unaware, 
Until  that  hour  when  they  shall  start,  awake — 
Seeing  themselves — and  shrieking  flee  such  goods, 
And  gauds;  those  things  that,  with  a  turtle's  gripe, 
Till  then,  they'd  clung  to. 

ETHEON — The  air  below  is  filled  with  finest  dust — 
From  this  they  modeled  forth  a  beauteous  maiden : 
Thereafter,  casting  sunlight  on  this  form 
Seemed  it  to  live;  and,  by  this  form  of  hers, 
Knew  I,  how  outward  nature,  acting  on  it, 
Would  fill  her  inward  mind;  and  saw  that  she 
Was  one  it  would  repay  us  well  to  serve. 

ELMO — How  would  you,  could  you,  serve  her? 

ETHEON— Why ,  I  have  seen  one  cruel  thing  on  earth : 
That  natures  that  are  fitted  each  to  each 
Oft  lead  a  life  that's  all  unsatisfied, 
Because  they  feel,  and  yet  they  do  not  know, 
The  other  lives  for  them;  yet  die,  and  never  meet. 
Therefore,  I've  brought  the  one  that's  fitted  for  her 
And  they  have  met,  and  in  a  moment  felt 
What  they  have  known  since  Neptune  touched,  last,  earth. 
To  consummate  my  plans 
I've  had  her  flee  her  home  within  the  woods; 
And,  to  prevent  her  guardian  following  her, 
Have  given  to  its  obedient  sprites  the  power 
To  play  such  tricks  as  pleased  them  most  upon  them. 


22 

They  lead  them  now  up  steeps;  through  briars  and  thorns, 

And  by  the  many  mansions  of  that  route; 

O'er  angular  rocks  that  mincing  feet  will  wound 

And  jar  out  lies,  like  toads,  from  mouths  that  hold  them; 

Through  swamps  and  wild  grapevines; 

Make  each  one  think  the  other  Sylvia, 

And  set  each  beating  each. 

Now  will  I  lead  her  on  through  trouble  and  woe 

To  drag  her  dead  world  from  her. 

ELMO — Has  she  no  earthly  friend  to  help  her? 

ETHEON — My  ministering  spirit  showed  an  aged  man 
Thinking  the  daughter  that  he  one  time  had 
Was  dead  in  infancy.     They  told  me  then, 
That  this  was  Sylvia's  father. 
Studied  I  then  his  brain,  and  of  the  spirits 
("Which  men  call  thoughts)  attracted  to  his  soul 
Saw  I,  'mongst  others,  these,  his  last  conclusions, 
Which  showed  me  odd  things  of  this  race  of  men. 
Men  knew  but  little,  and  seemed  not  to,  this : 
That  when  the  sun,  new-born,  goes  on  its  course, 
Its  number  altering  with  each  day  it  makes, 
Meets  it  and  greets  it  in  all  germs  their  number; 
Then  leap  they  at  its  music,  known  to  life. 
'Tis  what  man's  done  that  makes  him.     What  he  says, 
Though  books  of  eloquence  piled  mountains  high 
Contain  it — (please  them  as  it  may) — for  it, 
All  ears  it  enters  must  prove  barren  wombs, 
'Less  what  he  lauds  first  a  man  himself  has  done. 
That,  when  man  seems  held  fast,  and  bound  by  fate, 
Yet,  even  then,  relief  will  surely  come, 
And  by  some  path  that  will  seem  plain  enough— 


[The  following  is  to  be  inserted  between  lines  23  and  24  of 
Sixth  Edition,  on  page  23.] 

ETHKON — From  the  desire  to  see  itself,  all  is — 
For  this  is  love,  when  aught  to  love  it  seeks, 
In  atom,  or  the  highest;  and,  through  death, 
By  pain,  life  comes.     By  knowledge  comes  all  death, 
Which,  too,  came  as  was  light  first  manifest, 
While  motion,  heaving,  thereby  matter  wrought. — 
A  straight  line  first  the  day  from  night  set  off 
Wherefrom   two   curves,  through  which  is  life  made 
known. 

ELMO — Back  of  all  things  that  day  from  night  divide; 
Back  of  the  cell  wherein,  at  time  of  fullness, — 
(Because  one  ion  is  then  at  the  highest, 
Overlooking  all,  and  crucifixion  comes); — 
Back  of  the  needle's  eye  pressed  the  rock  was, 
Upon  whose  back  was  weight  of  all  the  world, 
Holding  bound  in  itself  all  things  that  are 
Until  the  wish,  itself  to  see,  is  come. 
There  then  comes  motion  and,  in  ordered  course 
Of  separation, — (with  them  moving  thence 
The  day,  the  night), — all  things  that  make  the  Earth, 
(So  they  may  note  it) — two  by  two  march  forth; 
The  lessened  density  of  ions  in  them 
Changing  their  shape  and  aspects  towards  that  source 
Wherefrom  they,  when  complete, — then  being  man, 
After  his  stature  full  is  reached, — the  image  are. 


When  has  the  fullness  of  his  task  been  worked 
But  which  he  had  completely  overlooked 
And  lost  all  memory  of. 

ELMO — This  is  a  good  commencement  for  an  end 
To  round  out  royally.     What  other  spirit 
Will  further  speak  of  what  has  been  discovered? 
Here  comes  one,  having  bright,  mischievous  eyes 
That  an  odd  humor  might  find,  ev'n  in  death. 

VONEA — I've  seen  their  life  is  just  an  odd  conceit 
Wrought  from  more  odd  conceits — 
Seeing  the  future  is  but  night  to  them. 
Queer  that,  worshiping  tenderness  to  all, 
Peace  grows  their  battlecry :     Thieving,  with  some, 
Their  spreading;  with  some  their  greed,  their  god. 
Those  that  start  war,  and  through  war,  seek  their  will, 
Yet  talk  of  heaven  to  be; 
Not  knowing  that  a  mind,  to  grow  to  that, 
Must,  by  desire,  fast  to  no  part  be  drawn; 
Must  rise  up,  over  all  this  realm  of  strife; 
Whose  hands  must  hold  no  more,  nor  cling  to  earth; 
To  go  in  there  must  leave  itself  without; 
His  mantle  of  earth  released — let  go  to  earth. 

ELIDAH — Whose  eye  that  so  long  doubled  was,  and 

kept  obscured, 

Be  merged,  be  single  made,  and  knowing — and  known 
To  that  straight  column,  straight  as  a  straight  rod 
That  is  the  light. 

Upholding  they  the  things  of  earth  as  high, 
Fall  they  down  with  them.    Saw  I,  this: 
Who  slowly  kills,  by  words  or  cruel  looks, 
Or  thoughts  unfair,  or  thoughts  by  hate  projected, 


24 

Is  as  much  murderer  as  is  the  one 
Who  does  so  with  a  bludgeon. 

AIDAEL — Whose  thoughts  are  drawn — forced  down  to 

central  earth. 

But  there  are  thoughts,  of  which  are  thoughts  of  art, 
Reversing  gravity,  and  they  hold  life. 

VONKA — This,  too,  saw  I  of  them : 
They're  never  all  good;  not  one  entirely  bad. 
The  worst  of  any  will,  at  times,  be  saints; 
The  best,  their  opposite. 

ELMO — What  knowledge  have  they 
Of  all  the  radiant  hosts  of  worlds  about  them  ? 

VONEA — They  scarce  conceive  that  all  the  things  of 

earth 

Are  things  in  miniature  of  worlds  full-grown. 
That,  as  their  nations  think  and  act  like  men, 
At  times  being  sane,  at  times  being  mad  as  they, 
So  is  their  race  a  unit  for  vast  worlds. 
That,  as  their  seas  have  puny  storms  upon  them, 
So  are  there  other  storms  that  sweep  through  space, 
Creating  vast  currents,  whirlpools  and  tides; 
Setting  world's  dancing  on  their  rushing  billows 
Like  corks  upon  the  ocean; 
Or,  carrying  systems  o'er  that  mighty  deep 
By  billows  hurrying,  rushing,  raging  onward, 
That  move  upon  the  beacon  lights  of  night 
And  surge  beyond.     They  dream  not  of  those  fleets 
That,  sails  all  set,  move  o'er  a  darker  ocean, 
Into  those  systems  where  are  lights  grown  dark — 
Not  earths,  not  suns. 
They  laugh  at  forces  fast  in  fading  halls— 


25 

The  universe  fast  in  the  soul  of  man; 

At  beings  crouching  on  the  star-storm  clouds; 

At  cities  dead  that  we  see  living  yet. 

Looking  within,  they  seem  to  see  these  things; 

But,  looking  without,  upon  the  world  again, 

They  call  them  fancies,  and  they  vanish  from  them. 

Ah,  if  they  only  knew  the  law  of  change — 

Why- 

The  arrow  drawn  back  towards  the  Southern  Cross,— 

Loosing  their  motion  that  makes  light  appear, 

The  earths  round  suns,  not  they  about  them  walk — 

And  knew  the  half  we  know — 

How  would  it  shake  their  minds  and  make  them  mad. 

ELMO — Wait  till  they  stand,  where  we  stand,  where's 

no  sea, 

All  worlds  external;  souls  then  where  time  is  not, 
Naked  in  space,  betwixt  things  garmented : — 
Then,  in  that  Eden  spot,  whence  all  world's  walk, 
That  land  of  Summer,  where  there  is  no  dark, 
Shall  men  learn  how  the  problem  death  solved  has  been; 
There  see  how  death  and  time  are  force,  are  change, 
And  view  these  motions  from  where  time  no  more  is; — 
Upon  a  level  with  the  north  pole  star. 
Beyond  these  looking — waiting. 

ETHEON — The  only  cause  of  all  is  ignorance, 
From  which  springs  prejudice  and  every  folly. 
This  shadow  of  death  is  now  most  heavy  on  them. 
But,  with  our  aid,  the  world  begins  to  move. 
This  century  has  promised  mighty  times 
That  will  outleap  the  tedious  course  of  nature, 
Leaving  behind  their  savagery  days  of  war; 


26 

Of  right  by  blood  to  be  the  manger  dog; 

Eights  called  divine,  and  many  another  right 

That  has  been  always  wrong. 

The  time  will  come  when  to  this  human  race 

The  only  king  will  be  the  king  of  hearts — 

When  each  man  will  refuse  such  goods  on  earth 

As  all  men  may  not  have. 

For  men  will  learn  that  day  that  true  it  is, 

That  only  one  thing  is  all- where  assured — 

Heart  of  a  gentle  man. 

VONEA — There's  this  as  their  excuse: 
How  much  their  life  from  infancy  to  age 
Is  the  world's  dead  world  working  outward  through  them. 

ELMO — Know  they  the  poorest  have  as  much  to  give 

as  any? 

That  each  time  ever  a  truth  is  told:  that  is  an  act 
To  all  men  a  donation  more  than  gifts? 
With  each  truth  told 

(Though  far  off  as  the  west  is  from  the  east) 
Some  fetter  dropping  off; 
Some  one,  till  then  enslaved,  by  that  made  free? 

YONBA — Nor  know  they  beings  wiser  than  themselves, 
Sometimes  stir  up  their  anger,  each  'gainst  each, 
To  wear  away  defects  that  are  within  them, 
Playing  those  forces  downward  and  upon  them, 
Whereof  they're  unaware. 

ELMO — Can  they  know  this : 

Man's  lack  of  heart  makes  earth  yield  lack  of  bread? 
That: 

Whenever  nations  have  bound  on  their  brows 
Phylacteries;  themselves  then,  better  holding 


27 

Than  others;  then  (those  others  robbed), 
Speaks  earth  in  famines? 
Know  they  the  heavenly  character  of  music 
That  tells  the  way  by  which  buds  turn  to  flowers, 
Inscribed  in  which  are  secrets  of  all  worlds 
Throughout  the  heavens;  which  our  beings  splendid 
As  their  law  read? 

ETHEON — 'Tis  sweet  to  them;  but  that  it  is  a  key 
Made  to  unbolt  their  gateway  into  heaven 
Know  not  they  all  of  them. 

ELMO — Odd,  odd  indeed !    Comes  now  our  time  to  move 
Upon  our  westward  journey  with  the  sun. 


ACT  IV. 

Scene. — Same  as  Scene  of  Act  II. 

DE  PETZY — Cheer  up.     This  is  no  time  for  gloominess. 
Go  join  the  dance. 

BLAUVELT — I'm  worn  and  weary,  and  am  sick  at  heart. 
Seeing  I've  searched  to  find  her  that  I  love 
These  many  days,  but  have  not  heard  of  her. 
But,  over  the  world  I'll  search, 
Following  th'ecliptic  of  our  lives  apart, 
Moving  the  table  round,  'till  I  win  all: 
From  icy  lands  within  the  bitter  North, 
Beneath  cold  skies  that  are  as  blue  as  steel, 
To  scorching  wastes  where  burn  the  sands  as  fire, 
And  hot  winds  dry  the  tongue  and  parch  the  throat — 
Aye,  till  this  frame  falls  helpless  at  the  last; 
Bib  from  my  form  that  in  my  sleep  was  taken, 
I  will  still  seek  her; 

On,  through  those  ages  we  must  stay  apart; 
On  still,  o'er  that  curvature,  till  we  meet, 
With  that  commencement  of  our  bliss  unutterable 
To  know  that  death  is  dead. 

DE  PETZY — You  say  you've  found  her  father,  too, 
Who  now  assists  in  searching  for  her? 

JESSE — Go  join  the  dance.    I  take't  no  compliment 
You  will  not  join.     Why,  what  a  long-drawn  visage! 
Cheer  up.     'Twill  all  end  well. 
The  one  who  makes  your  face  so  melancholy 
Will  be  kind  yet. 

BLAUVELT — No  act  unkind  has  given  to  me  my  sadness. 


29 

DE  PETZY — Where  was  it  that  you  last  lost  track  of  her? 

BLAUVELT — Why,  first  she  wandered  through  those 

gloomy  woods, 
That  make  these  woods; 
Then  crossed  the  fields  and  over  dusty  roads, 
Till,  reaching  that  city,  entered  she  into  it. 
The  sounds  of  city  life  to  her  were  strange, 
And  many  a  time  they  filled  her  mind  with  dread 
(So  have  I  learned  from  those  who  did  observe  her). 
Day  in,  day  out,  she  wandered  through  the  streets, 
But  found  not  what  she  sought. 
At  last,  'tis  said,  she  wearied  of  this  life, 
And  pined  for  streams,  the  wild  flowers  and  these  woods. 
And  often  was  now  seen  by  the  ocean, 
Listening  to  hear  each  message  that  the  waves 
Had  brought  from  distant  ports;  or,  in  the  fields, 
That  nearest  stood  beside  the  city's  edge, 
Would  she  pluck  flowers  to  gaze  upon  their  faces 
And  get  what  women  get  (though  knowing  not  what) 
Who  love  them; 

And  from  them  read,  as  from  a  mirrored  image, 
Of  distant  streams,  and  mountains  blue,  and  woods. 
At  last,  those  who'd  observed,  lost  sight  of  her — 
From  that  point  learned  I  nothing.         [Enter  SYLVIA.] 
But  who  comes  here?    Now,  if  my  eyes  deceive  me — 

SYLVIA — At  last! 

BLAUVELT — Tell  me — where  have  you  been? 
What  land  has  been  so  lighted  by  your  eyes, 
No  sun  was  needed? 

SYLVIA — Three  weary  days,  and  nights  as  weary,  too, 
I've  seen  the  stars  creating  light  by  night, 


The  mightier  sun  relieving  them  by  day, 
But  found  you  not.    Then  grew  most  weary  I. 
At  last  rose  up  a  light  forth  from  the  ground 
Which  moved  before,  and,  following  after  it, 

Came  I,  till  here. 

BLAUVELT — Was  it  an  angel  that  led  Sylvia? 
Seeing  so  soft  and  gentle  are  her  thoughts 
That  in  them  might  one  come? 
And  now  the  day  of  parting  is  o'erpast, 
And  part  will  we  no  more. 

SYLVIA — Not  on  this  earth,  and  when  death  comes  to  one 
Then  will  we  lie  each  in  the  others  arms 
And,  as  one  dies,  the  other  die  as  well, 
And  both,  thus  joined,  pass  to  the  realms  of  sleep. 


SUPPLEMENT 

[Which  was  at  the  end  of  previous  editions! 

[Matter  is  here  set  forth  for  the  aid  of  some  of  the  British  reviewers,  who 
have  believed  that  they  have  reviewed  the  book  to  which  this  Supple 
ment  is  appended,  but  who  have  not— although  the  looks  from  their 
eyes  have  passed  over  its  pages— even  seen  all  that  is  within  the  work.] 

The  question  as  to  whether  the  author  of  the  foregoing  book,  copies 
of  which  have  been  placed  in  the  hands  of  many  readers  in  Europe,  Asia, 
Canada,  the  United  States  of  America  and  Islands  of  the  Pacific,  is 
a  " Spiritualist,  Christian  Scientist,  Theosophist  or  what?"  has  called 
from  him  letters  of  which  that  given  below  is  one.  It  is  printed  here  in 
order  that  it  may  serve  as  an  answer  to  some  questions  that  the  book  itself 
will  continue — as  long  as  brute  force  continues  in  any  part  of  the  world 
to  be  used  by  one  set  of  men  as  a  means  of  rule  over  another — to  arouse; 
and  for  yet  an  additional  reason — namely,  that  it  may  serve  to  convey 
to  the  world  some  knowledge  upon  the  subject  of  Art  that  such  reviews, 
by  British  reviewers,  of  the  earlier  issues  of  the  work  as  have  reached 
him,  have  not  appeared  to  the  author  to  possess.  A  knowledge  of  Art 
in  its  higher  manifestation  (if  judgment  is  based  solely  upon  their 
printed  utterances)  is  a  matter  in  regard  to  which  these  particular 
reviewers  have  appeared  to  be  not  conscious.  Seeming,  as  they  have 
done  in  a  great  variety  of  ways,  to  display  lack  of  knowledge  of  what 
Art  may  be,  it  appears  to  be  but  proper  to  place  here  before  the  world 
some  knowledge,  not  in  their  reviews,  of  that  which  Art  in  time  may 
come  to  be. 

And  for  that  reason  the  following  letter  is  here  placed  before  men, 
and  such  readers  as  can  come  to  be  aware  of  it: 

DEAR  MADAM:  I  will  try  to  answer  your  questions.  It  is  my  belief 
that  with  others  who  do  what  we  do  we  are  one;  and  also  that,  to  those 
who  do  the  things  that  we  have  done,  our  thoughts  must  in  time  go.  But 
the  process  by  which  we  may  come  to  dwell  each  in  the  other  may  be 
slow,  or  it  may  be  sudden.  There  is,  as  I  understand  it,  but  one  way 
by  which  I  can  come  to  dwell  in  another,  and  he  in  me;  and  that  one 
way  is  by  doing  what  he  does  or  what  he  has  done.  If  I  am  to  become 
a  member  of  an  organization  or  society  having  rules  of  admission,  I  am 
enabled  to  become  one  by  first  doing  the  things  that  others  to  become 
such  have  done.  What  the  society  does  the  person  on  the  outside,  who 


hag  not  done  those  things  that  make  a  man  a  member,  does  not  know. 
So,  if  I  wish  to  find  and  stand  at  the  point  in  the  universe  from  which 
will  gush  forth  the  same  stream  of  thought  which  in  times  past  has 
poured  into  the  soul  of  prophet  and  poet,  builder  or  artist,  I  must  first 
walk  along  the  way  that  was  found  by  him,  and  then  stand  where  he 
stood.  Should  I  wish  to  think  as  does  the  beggar  on  the  street  who, 
with  shame,  begs,  in  order  that  another  may  be  helped,  or  as  does  a 
bishop,  or  university  president,  without  shame,  for  the  same  end  (blame 
being  to  neither  of  them,  but  only  to  those  who,  upon  being  asked,  do 
not,  in  fact  as  well  as  in  form,  divide  with  those  whose  need  is  found 
to  be  greater  than  is  their  own,  their  bread),  I  must  do  what  they  have 
done.  If  I  wish  to  think  as  does  a  captain  of  industry,  I  must  live  for 
that  one  purpose,  and  must  make  my  eyes  blind  and  my  ears  deaf  to 
any  effect  upon  others  of  my  deeds  which  would  delay  or  prevent  the 
accomplishment  of  my  one  purpose.  That  which,  among  all  of  my 
works  must  be  my  purpose  placed  most  high,  must  be  to  become  an 
industry  captain.  But,  should  my  choice  be  given  to  them,  and  those 
things  be  done  by  me,  because  in  them  is  my  whole  heart,  my  mind  and 
my  strength,  those  other  thoughts  and  powers  will  never  be  able  to 
enter,  or  so  far  penetrate  into  me  that  I  will  be  able  even  seriously  to 
believe  in  their  existence,  that  come  to  the  prophet,  who  has  another 
purpose,  desired  by  the  whole  of  his  heart,  and  with  all  of  his  strength, 
or  to  the  musician  or  poet,  who,  throughout  life,  has  persistently  refused 
to  permit  himself  to  become  filled,  to  the  exclusion  of  that  which  he  is 
destined  to  obtain,  with  those  things  by  which  a  merchant  obtains  his 
reward — the  reward  that  comes  from  a  willingness  not  to  forego  success, 
but  yet  to  press  on  forward  to  obtain  it  after  he  has  become  aware  that, 
by  each  additional  effort  made  by  him  to  obtain  it,  the  struggle  of  others 
of  his  fellows  is  made  yet  more  onerous. 

The  poet,  on  the  other  hand,  and  prophet,  seek  above  all  things,  to 
get  beyond  the  region  in  nature  where  the  transfers  and  exchanges 
taking  place  constitute  the  parent  or  starting-point  of  those  evanescent 
processes  in  the  world  called  commerce,  that,  seemingly  stable,  are 
ephemeral,  and  among  the  things  first  forgotten.  With  an  intuitive 
knowledge  or  instinct  towards  the  things  that  are  lasting,  the  poet  and 
prophet  seeks  to  get,  notwithstanding  his  resisting  outer  nature,  beyond 
this  realm  of  the  babbles  that  burst  into  the  place  where  the  dreams 
are,  which  are  the  only  things  that  have  a  permanent  and  an  everlasting 
foundation.  But  if  ever  his  dreams  become  strong  enough  to  lift  him 
up  out  of  the  commercial  willingness  to  prosper  at  the  cost  of  another 
man's  distress,  the  things  that  have,  at  such  cost,  come  to  him,  must  fall 


away  from  him.  For  he  has  been  lifted  by  his  dreams  from  a  place  in 
which  things  of  one  kiud  could  be  to  another  in  which  they  cannot. 
And  he  will  from  choice  now  leave,  as  to  him  of  little  worth,  the  things 
or  methods  that  create  the  success  of  the  industry  captain— methods 
that  make  fame  and  achieve  for  the  politician  or  ecclesiastic  the  chief 
places  or  seats.  He  will  leave  them  to  obtain  those  things  that  to  the 
amazed  captains  of  industry— and  rightly  from  their  view-point — con 
stitute  a  mere  matter  of  midsummer  madness. 

In  other  words,  as  these  matters  seem  to  be  seen  by  me,  the  parent 
of  a  thought — if  the  thought  is  one  that  is  to  rise  up,  and  constitute  the 
nucleus  of  a  star,  which  will  thereafter  grow  into  form  and  take  its  place 
in  the  heavens— must  be  first  that  which  is  back  of  all  things  that  are 
destined  to  live— an  impulse;  the  impulse  will  then  be  followed  by  an 
act,  and  the  act  by  its  thought.  And  to  be  with  and  of  others,  they  and 
we  must  have  acted  from  the  same  impulse,  intuition  or  spirit  Our 
deeds  will  then  be  of  the  same  class,  kind  or  kingdom. 

Thoughts,  like  men,  have  their  measured,  fixed  and  appointed 
periods  of  life.  And,  as  I  have  looked  at  thoughts,  those  that  have  been 
of  longest  life  have  had  for  their  parents  acts  that  looked  as  if  they  were 
destined  to  bring  to  those  who  were,  for  the  time  being,  controlled  by 
them,  the  opposite  of  that  for  which  the  world  of  traffic  seeks — the  least. 
The  deeds  thus  prompted  were  the  opposite  of  those  of  timidity;  were 
deeds  that,  as  they  have  sought  but  little  or  nothing  for  self,  have  been 
deeds  that  have  been  most  courageous. 

But,  should  the  steps  taken  by  poet  or  prophet  be  taken  even  for  such 
pure  gain  as  gain  of  knowledge,  when  the  gain  sought  is  to  be  only  for 
self  it  will  be  nothing,  for  it  will  still  belong  to  the  world  of  commerce, 
and  be  mere  traffic  For,  as  long  as  gain  remains  the  object,  no  more  can 
be  obtained  through  the  spirit  of  that  effort  than  can  be  obtained 
through  the  spirit  of  any  other  traffic,  and  its  fruits  will  be  the  same- 
be  only  that  which  comes  from  traffic :  and  it  will  be  as  well  to  work  as 
a  politician — for  the  fruit  of  traffic  can  rise  no  higher  than  a  material 
thing,  and  will  be,  in  that  case,  an  office;  or,  as  a  soldier  fighting  for 
territory,  who  goes  forth  to  take  from  another  people  their  land,  and,  as 
compensation,  gets  applause,  or  a  certain  and  unfailing  income,  which 
the  business  career  of  a  private  citizen  would  not  so  certainly  assure 
him,  by  which  he  is  led  to  feel  certain  of  the  bread  that  will  keep  in  him 
the  kind  of  life  that  he  is  ready  to  take  away  from  others  in  order  that 
he  himself  may  not  lose  it. 

Upon  the  other  hand,  the  reward  of  one  who  would  become  a  Master 
of  Arts  is  that  which  comes  from  desiring  rather  to  abandon  and  walk 


away  from  the  certainty  of  bread  or  applause  than  ever  to  acquire  it  at 
the  cost  of  another  man's  welfare.  But,  nevertheless,  a  man  should  do 
no  thing  so  long  as  he  does  not,  above  all  other  things,  prefer  it — and 
that  is,  love  it.  When  the  time  comes  for  him  to  take  the  steps  (after 
emptying  himself  of  the  lower  things  that  are  traffic),  through  which 
there  will  be  caused  to  flow  in  to  him  other  things,  he  will,  through  that 
which  alone  can  prompt  such  acts — through  love  of  them — perform 
them.  And  what  others  do  will  be  then  to  him  nothing.  For  he  will 
then  see  that  no  man  should  ever  take  such  a  step  as  the  poet,  prophet 
or  artist  will  have  taken  from  any  other  cause  at  all  but  one — from  love 
of  it.  If  there  still  remain  to  him  other  things  that  he  prefers  to  do  it  is 
best  that  they  should  be  the  things  still  done  by  him.  But,  of  these 
matters  that  the  high  artists  have  done  it  is  hard  to  speak  clearly  and 
plainly,  and  it  has  always  been  considered  easier  to  make  them  plain 
rather  by  reference  and  by  metaphor.  For,  so  long  as  we  lead  lives  that 
must  in  many  respects  differ,  and  until  the  time  comes  when  we  will  live 
each  in  the  other  and  lead  one  life,  there  will  be  things  that  we  will 
not  be  able  to  speak  plainly  and  face  to  face  each  to  the  other,  and  long 

letters  will  say  but  little. 

*    *    * 

That  beings  in  this  world  can  become  surrounded  by  and  aware  of, 
and  served  by  others  who  have  gone  out  of  their  garments  of  flesh,  is 
my  own  belief,  or  dream.  For  our  beliefs  are  only  and  no  more  than 
mere  dreams.  And  so  I  speak  of  that  which  I  know  as  a  dream,  and  for 
two  reasons:  First,  because  its  dreams  have  been  always  the  most  real 
of  all  the  things  of  earth;  and  this  is  for  the  reason  that  of  all  the  subjects 
of  merchandise,  and  properties  that  are  owned  by  merchants,  who  call 
themselves  the  practical  ones  of  the  earth,  have  had  their  birth  origin 
ally,  and  their  start,  out  of  dreams,  exactly  as,  through  the  dreams  of 
earth's  dreamers  and  poets,  will  the  merchandise  accumulated  by  the 
methods  which  earth's  merchants  now  follow,  for  which  such  merchants 
will  then  mourn,  be  caused  to  pass,  as  does  a  vapor  before  the  sunlight 
of  morning,  or  as  falls  away  the  grain  before  the  sweep  of  the  sickle.  I 
speak  of  the  presence  of  those  noble  ones  about  us  who,  when  clothed 
in  the  flesh,  would  not  gain  aught  at  the  cost  of  a  wound,  or  of  loss  to 
another,  as  a  dream,  because  I  have  stood  in  that  attitude  in  which, 
when  he  is  possessed  of  naught  but  dreams,  one  can  look  and  can  see 
what  dreams  are  in  men,  and  I  have  seen  that  such  dreams  as  are  theirs, 
and  such  dreams  as  are  the  dreams  of  those  of  this  world  who  do  not 
deem  their  own  opinions  to  be  wiser  than  is  the  wisdom  of  non-resist 
ance,  to  be  dreams  that  are  not  to  be  outlasted  by  time. 


And  for  these  reasons  I  would  express  such  ideas  as  it  is  attempted 
here  to  set  forth  in  the  language  of  the  most  stable  of  all  the  things  that 
are— namely,  by  calling  them  dreams;  and  by  saying  that  with  me,  it  is 
a  dream  that,  when  aware  of  his  own  resplendent  intellectual  endow 
ments,  and  knowing  that  by  using  them  as  did  the  rulers  of  her  civili 
zation  of  an  hour,  he  could  have  placed  himself  at  the  head  of  her 
ecclesiastical  system,  or  have  stood  upon  the  pinnacle  of  her  commerce, 
chief  among  the  chief  captains  of  the  industry  of  Judea,  Jesus  of  Naza 
reth  preferred  instead  to  turn  away  from  the  methods  of  those  who,  in 
her  esteem  were  held  to  be  highest,  to  stand  at  the  place  of  and  feel 
with  them  from  the  view-point  of  those  who  were  held  by  her  to  be  but 
degenerates  and  outcasts  there  did  gather  all  at  once  about  him,  and 
become  able  to  serve  and  minister  to  him,  all  of  those  daring  ones  of  the 
world  of  whom  in  times  past  the  world  had  not  been  worthy.  And  that 
is  a  dream. 

And  it  is  my  dream  (being  myself  one  of  those  who,  in  this  world 
where  strife  is  the  cause  of  illusions,  is  a  practical  man)  that,  upon  this 
step  being  so  determiued  upon  by  him  that  it  was  to  come  to  be  taken, 
there  did  come  to  him,  and  for  months  thereafter  remain  with  him,  as 
the  outcome  of  the  operation  of  one  of  nature's  laws — where  strife  is  not — 
such  power  over  the  air  as  made  the  winds  in  their  causes  subject  to  his 
will  until  they  could  be  hushed  by  it,  whereupon,  the  winds  ceasing,  the 
waters  on  the  neighboring  lake  would  be  caused  to  subside.  Such  a 
will,  under  the  laws  of  nature,  was  the  kind  of  will  that  could  be  put 
into  him  by  thought  such  as  was  his  thought;  but  the  power  of  that 
thought  could  come  forth  only  out  of  knowledge  that  could  believe  no 
fellow-man  himself  to  be  degenerate — knowledge  that  could  know  of  no 
one  fittest  to  survive. 

This,  too,  I  dream:  That  when  Siddartha  (Gautama  Buddha),  the 
compassionate,  went  away  from  his  palace  forever  to  learn,  by  living  it, 
what  was  the  view-point  of  India's  outcasts,  there  did,  indeed,  as  has 
been  said,  gather  about  him  when  he  was  under  the  Bo  tree  all  of  those 
who,  by  that  act,  were  made  to  be  dwellers  in  and  to  become  one  with  him, 
through  having  done  deeds  that  were  of  the  same  spirit  of  compassion 
that  had  prompted  his  act. 

And  I  dream  a  dream  (that  comes  from  what  taught  him)  that  when 
Socrates,  the  jester  for  truth  (one  of  that  mighty  line  that  fortunately 
has,  and  will  yet  have,  descendants),  was,  with  the  utmost  coolness,  ready 
to  drink  the  hemlock  for  having  spoken  that  which  the  timid,  and 
nations  whose  hands  are  war-stained,  strive  ever  to  hide  and  conceal, 
and,  amid  his  disturbed  friends,  spoke  undisturbed  of  his  death,  there 


6 

was  in  his  own  words,  for  him,  more  than  he'allowed  them  to  know;  and 
that  he  was,  during  his  discourse,  made  calm  by  the  near  presence  of 
those  great  ones,  at  the  moment  ministering  to  him,  into  contact  with 
whom  he  had  been  brought  through  a  deed  done  such  as  they  before 
him  had  performed;  and  that  his  genius— his  own  spirit— his  father  in 
heaven — the  monitor  of  whom  he  had  so  many  times  spoken — was,  in 
those  high  moments,  so  near  to  him  that  the  whole  earth  and  heaven 
had  already  begun  to  take  on  for  him  a  new  shape  and  beauty  and 
things  a  rare  and  new  meaning,  such  as  were  cause  of  a  deep  and  a  new 
wonder  to  him.  These  things  I  dream,  and,  seeing  them  one  and 
eternal  with  that  of  which  they  themselves  are  an  embodied  and  perma 
nent  part,  I  cannot  escape  from  believing.  With  the  hope  that,  on 
paper,  they  may  have  served  the  purpose  that,  in  placing  them  here,  I 
have  hoped  for,  I  am, 

Very  respectfully, 

ADAIB  WBLCKEB. 


SCIENTIFIC  EXPLANATION  AND  FOUNDATION  OF  THE 
IDEA  OF  HELL. 

Since  the  article  given  below — (in  many  publications  since  pub 
lished) — was  written,  volcanic  eruptions,  such  as  were  never  before 
known,  have  occurred;  and,  if  those  obsessed  by  ideas  of  past  ages,  and 
given,  as  playthings  conforming  to  those  ideas  of  obsession,  warships, 
are  still  retained,  or  selected  by  nations  to  act  as  their  rulers,  and  such, 
their  rulers,  with  these,  their  playthings,  shoot  more  children  or  women 
to  death,  events  still  more  startling  will  happen.  The  following  article, 
relating  to  volcanic  eruptions  that  were  to  come,  is  the  one  to  which  the 
volcanic  eruptions  that  have  since  occurred  have  related: 

In  the  opening  article  of  "  McClure's  Magazine "  for  March,  1902, 
the  statement  is  made  that  Professor  Loeb  of  Chicago  conceives  life  and 
electricity  to  be  the  same;  and  also  believes  it  to  be  the  fact  that,  as  the 
result  of  the  magnificent  work  done  by  him  and  those  assisting  him,  life 
may  come  to  be  prolonged.  With  the  last  statement  I  agree;  but,  as 
will  appear  from  the  pages  of  a  manuscript  book  entitled,  "His  Verses 
(with  That  in  Them  Which  Is),  for  Those  Kindest  Hearted,"  copies  of 
which  were  presented  by  me  several  years  ago  to  libraries  of  Royal 
Societies  in  Ireland,  Scotland  and  England,  to  the  chief  universities  of 
those  countries,  to  the  chief  universities  of  Australia  and  Canada,  and 


to  the  chief  universities  of  the  United  States  of  America,  with  the  first 
statement  I  do  not,  in  all  respects,  agree.  In  one  of  the  poems  con 
tained  in  the  manuscript  book,  the  title  of  the  poem  being,  "  How  to 
Overcome  the  Last  Enemy,"  are  these  words:  "For  electrified  is  action, 
and  (transmuted)  will,  through  deeds,  come  a  force  to  end  all  dying," 
etc.,  etc. 

Action  is,  indeed,  as  has  been  seen  by  Professor  Loeb,  the  result  of 
the  operation  of  electricity;  for,  as  in  the  poem  stated,  "electrified  is 
action;"  but,  back  of  electricity  is  something  more  subtle,  which  deter 
mines  its  character — as  to  whether  the  manifested  electricity  will  be 
negative  or  positive.  This  subtle  something  is  thought.  But  thought 
is  of  two  kinds.  One  kind  is  the  kind  in  nature  that  is  back  of  the 
impulse  that  causes  the  world  to  most  highly  honor  and  pay  those 
willing,  for  such  rewards,  to  take  the  lives  of  their  fellows;  the  other  is 
back  of  the  impulse  that  will  cause  men  rather  to  forego  reward  than 
accept  it  as  the  return  coming  for  destruction  to  limb  or  life  of  the  least 
of  their  fellows.  It  is  the  form  of  thought  that  prompts  the  highest 
known  form  of  human  courage,  whose  ultimate  aim  ever  is  not  destruc 
tion,  but  creation;  whose  offspring  was  the  discovery  of  the  X-ray,  and 
such  work  as  has  beeu  done — for  which  the  world  has  not  capacity  suffi 
cient  to  reward  him — by  Professor  Loeb. 

Professor  Loeb  justly  complains  that,  in  America,  rewards  go,  not  to 
those  engaged  in  such  work  as  his,  but  rather  to  those  who  profit  from 
politics.  This  is  a  discouraging  fact.  Still,  to  know  this  may  give  him 
heart  to  persist  in  his  work:  that  outside  of  the  walls  of  American  uni 
versities  are  artists,  writers  and  discoverers  working— and  who  have 
for  long  years  worked — for  whom  such  institutions  have  done,  and  do, 
nothing. 

But  back  of  the  gigantic  natural  force,  whose  initial  or  starting  point 
is  within  the  brain  of  man,  is  more  than  is  above  stated.  The  great 
storage  battery  for  electricity  in  one  of  its  forms  of  expression — that 
whose  starting  point  is  in  imperialistic  or  despotic  thought— is  the  cen 
tral  earth.  And  it  was  therefore  not  for  nothing  that  the  Seers  of  old 
prophesied  for  peoples  seeking,  above  all  other  things,  prosperity,  a  fate 
such  as  came  upon  Gomorrah  and  Sodom.  For,  back  of  the  vague 
perception  which,  during  the  long  ages,  has  been  in  the  minds  of  men 
waiting  to  be  worked  out,  that  this  earth  can,  because  of  their  acts  and 
thoughts,  come  to  be  destroyed  by  fire,  there  has  been  always,  although 
it  has  not  been  put  into  formulated  expression,  a  law  and  a  scientific 
foundation.  Injustice  and  its  offspring  coercion,  or  that  action  upon  the 
part  of  any  people  through  which  it  takes  a  portion  of  the  earth's  sur- 

299013 


8 

face  away  from  any  other  people  by  violence,  ever  creates  and/stores  up 
within  the  earth  an  electrical  force  that,  going  to  and  fro  TOthin  it,  is, 
step  by  step,  performing  the  work  that  can  some  day  causX  the  earth's 
surface  to  sink  and  collapse  and  molten  lava  and  fire  fromirithin  to/ome 
through  the  crevasses  then  formed,  and  spread  out  over  fts  surface. 

Thought  is  a  gigantic  natural  power  and  its  operation  not  yet  fully 
comprehended;  but  the  time  will  come  when  it  will" Joe  a  factr  apparent 
that  all  of  those  who,  in  pulpit  or  press,  uphold  thaf  application  of  tort 
ure  to  their  fellow-men,  such  as  was  not  practiced  by  jme  armies  of 
pagan  times,  are,  whether  they  are  aware  of  the/fact  oriuot,  but  hasten 
ing,  by  their  thought  and  intent,  the  time  ofJflie  arrival  of  such  a  final 
result.  •  /  jr 

The  prophets  and  poets  of  ancient  times,  aljjfcough  in  their  outer 
natures  they  had  not  yet  come  to  see  ifhat,  ba/K  of  their  prophecies, 
there,  rested  a  principle  of  science,  ygn  had  \nthin  them  an  intuitive 
consciousness  of  the  fact  that  injustice,  doite  by  any  man  upon  earth, 
brings  about  simultaneous  changes'  within^t;  and  they  were  wiser  than 
they  knew  when  their  intuitions^told  thejn  that  hypocricy,  brutality  and 
greed  on  earth  might  bring  about  destruction  from  within  it  if  ever  the 
time  should  come  when  sucbran  abomination  of  desolation  should  make 
its  appearance  upon  the^Erth  as/towns  and  villages  having  the  torch 
set  to  them  in  liberty's  n/ftne,  and/in  that  name  gun  and  sword  used  to 
make  of  any  place  inhibited  by/tnan  a  wilderness. 

Unless  work  of  that  character  ceases  to  be  done,  lightning,  or  the  elec 
tricity  that  the  mirids  of  men  can  create,  will,  by  all  men,  be  seen  to  fall 
from  heaven.  Anil,  although  from  the  time  of  the  world's  foundation,  it 
has  been  in  process  of  generation  through  each  act  of  coercion  and 
oppression,  each  act  .for  expansion  by  conquest,  although  they  have  not 
yet  all  of  them  se0n  it,  each  man  may,  before  the  present  generation 
shall  have,  all  of  jrt,  departed,  come,  in  many  places,  to  see  it. 


•• 


ADAIB  WELOKEB. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  LOS  ANGELES 

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